have been the case at some time or other in the
silvery globe then shining upon him. His eye travelled over the
length and breadth of that distant country--over the Bay of Rainbows,
the sombre Sea of Crises, the Ocean of Storms, the Lake of Dreams, the
vast Walled Plains, and the wondrous Ring Mountains--till he almost
felt himself to be voyaging bodily through its wild scenes, standing
on its hollow hills, traversing its deserts, descending its vales and
old sea bottoms, or mounting to the edges of its craters.

While he watched the far-removed landscape a tawny stain grew into
being on the lower verge: the eclipse had begun. This marked a
preconcerted moment: for the remote celestial phenomenon had been
pressed into sublunary service as a lover's signal. Yeobright's mind
flew back to earth at the sight; he arose, shook himself and listened.
Minute after minute passed by, perhaps ten minutes passed, and the
shadow on the moon perceptibly widened. He heard a rustling on his
left hand, a cloaked figure with an upturned face appeared at the base
of the Barrow, and Clym descended. In a moment the figure was in his
arms, and his lips upon hers.

"My Eustacia!"

"Clym, dearest!"

Such a situation had less than three months brought forth.

They remained long without a single utterance, for no language could
reach the level of their condition: words were as the rusty implements
of a by-gone barbarous epoch, and only to be occasionally tolerated.

"I began to wonder why you did not come," said Yeobright, when she had
withdrawn a little from his embrace.

"You said ten minutes after the first mark of shade on the edge of the
moon, and that's what it is now."

"Well, let us only think that here we are."

Then, holding each other's hand, they were again silent, and the
shadow on the moon's disc grew a little larger.

"Has it seemed long since you last saw me?" she asked.

"It has seemed sad."

"And not long? That's because you occupy yourself, and so blind
yourself to my absence. To me, who can do nothing, it has been like
living under stagnant water."

"I would rather bear tediousness, dear, than have time made short by
such means as have shortened mine."

"In what way is that? You have been thinking you wished you did not
love me."

"How can a man wish that, and yet love on? No, Eustacia."

"Men can, women cannot."

"Well, whatever I may have thought, one thing is certain--I
do love you--past all compass a